Elsa Williams #00078 Woodland Animals Crewel Kit finished

 Feeling happy to have finished the Elsa Williams Woodland Animals Crewel kit #00078  , which is a beautiful sampler of different basic embroidery stitches .

  Heritage Embroidery by Elsa Williams Published - Van Nostrand Rienhold Company in 1967 .

 I dipped into this vintage embroidery book , every now and again to take a clearer look at the stitch instructions .
 I would say that on the whole most of these basic stitches , could be learnt from the book, if you were a complete beginner .... with the exception maybe of the the French knot and the Tufted stitch , which would be better if someone could sit beside you and show you . There are plenty of youtubes and tutorials on line , but there's nothing like having someone actually demonstrate it to you .

                   So ,   " Dear Elsa Williams , what do you think of my French Knots ? "

 The Tufted Stitch  , was the most frightening stitch for me , but I think I have grasped it now .

 I finally chose this shade of green for the centre of the main large sunflower , this was not clear at all on the instructions .

                That tiny little pink flower , each petal all different shades of rose-pink  !

                                         Then to proudly stitch my name on .

                      The reverse ...for those who strangely always insist on seeing it  .
I always begin and end on the front and use every little scrap of thread. I never throw any of the cut off ends of threads away . I am very miserly with my crewel wool !
  I have plenty of bundles thread left over..except for the palest  yellow /gold . I used up all but about one inch of it and used that last bit to stitch the daisy in my name . Very strange how they  didn't put so much of the yellow into the kit ....anyone else with less stitching experience might have run out of this pale yellow wool and been stuck .
 I'll have to have a think about what I can do with this left over crewel wool .

             So now I,ve finished it and am thinking about having it framed .
I have another project, a medieval picture to finish , one I,ve designed myself  and have been slowly working on over the last year .
    So maybe I,ll show you some of this next time  . Happy stitching .